The complete International Director of snooker players - John Kobylecky has 37-31 (page 225) as the score stating "The key to his victory was his session whitewash which took him to 27-21. Spencer closed to 31-33 ahead of Higgins' four frame winning run to the line".

Seems strange that there is a disputed score in a world final. What is the truth?

Ordinarily, i would trust Clive Everton as the font of all (snooker & billiards) knowledge. In his 'the Story of Billiards & Snooker' (published 1978) he gives the score as 37-32. Perhaps we'll never know for sure. I suppose we have to trust the official sources; the WST website, for example, has it 37-31 so I guess that is the 'official' score. I would love to know how the confusion came about though.

Seems the newspapers of the day were reporting it as 37-31. I'd go with that. The fact that there is one frame (out of the whole final) with a 'missing frame score' is more than dubious.

Tried posting links but they don't seem to work properly. Seen Sports pages from the Sydney Morning Herald, the Glasgow Morning Post and the Age (?) all from the day after the conclusion and all reporting as 37-31.

SnookerEd25 wrote:Ordinarily, i would trust Clive Everton as the font of all (snooker & billiards) knowledge. In his 'the Story of Billiards & Snooker' (published 1978) he gives the score as 37-32. Perhaps we'll never know for sure. I suppose we have to trust the official sources; the WST website, for example, has it 37-31 so I guess that is the 'official' score. I would love to know how the confusion came about though.

Even better, I'd love to hear from someone who was there...

It would seem very likely that Clive Everton would have been there in person, reporting for Snooker Scene yet just six years later printed the score wrongly in his own publication (maybe?).

i guess snooker scene would have carried a full report of the match - with reporters that had been in attendance - so what did Clive Everton's magazine say i wonder?